US agency that regulates Internet service too poor to build a good website

And now the FCC's budget request could be undercut by $53 million.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler says budget constraints have forced his agency "to operate with an IT infrastructure that would be unacceptable to any well-managed business." This is why the FCC website has crashedmultiple times when inundated by people trying to submit comments on the commission's network neutrality plan, Wheeler says.

The comments website relies on a backend system created in 1996. To handle the influx of comments, the FCC extended the deadline and set up an e-mail address that could accept comments into the official record.

And it could get worse, as Congress is fighting over whether to cut the FCC's budget or approve a requested funding increase.

"Efforts to upgrade this IT capability were a casualty of sequestration," Wheeler wrote in a blog post yesterday. "Most recently, the agency requested of Congress approximately $13 million for IT upgrades in the FY 2015 appropriation. I appreciate that the Senate subcommittee has provided the Commission with full funding in its FY 2015 spending bill, so that we can make these important upgrades. Unfortunately, the appropriations bill passed by the House today would fund the FCC at $17 million below current levels and $53 million below our overall budget request, dramatically undermining any effort to modernize our IT systems."

The House is controlled by Republicans, while the Senate is controlled by Democrats.

The FCC had a $450 million budget in fiscal 2014, which ends September 30. Among other things, the FCC's 2015 budget request includes $9.2 million for "modernization of aging IT systems." The FCC is funded entirely by regulatory fees and auction revenue, but Congress and the president decide how much the commission can spend.

"About 40% of the FCC's application portfolio is more than 10 years old, and 70% of the IT portfolio depends on [deprecated], legacy technologies," the request states.

"It is particularly distasteful that the FCC—the agency entrusted with promoting a world-class broadband infrastructure for the nation—could ever be incapable of dealing with Americans expressing themselves via that broadband capability," Wheeler wrote.

If the budget request is fully funded, the commission would have the equivalent of 1,790 full-time employees, up from 1,735 this year.

The FCC also requested an extra $625,000 for Enforcement Bureau equipment. Besides creating net neutrality rules, the commission will also have to enforce them, as well as existing rules. We've asked an FCC spokesperson if the House budget would hinder the FCC's enforcement capabilities and will provide an update if we get one. (UPDATE: The FCC pointed us to congressional testimony in which Wheeler said, "Cuts in employees left us chronically understaffed in enforcement, for example, so that our work to police pirate radio activities suffered—a big concern among some broadcasters—as we focused all available resources on public safety and homeland security activities. Likewise, we never replaced or upgraded our enforcement equipment. In fact, we have more than 200 relic IT systems that are costing the agency more to service than they would to replace over the long term.")

Other FCC budget requests include $5.8 million for pay and retirement fund increases, $1.3 million for an IT storage expansion, $2.1 million for three "cybersecurity" programs, and $1 million for improvements to the National Broadband Map. The FCC also requested $10.9 million to reform the Universal Service Fund, which the FCC says will lead to cost savings.

The FCC's operating budget is only part of the money it controls. For example, the FCC voted last week to spend an extra $5 billion over the next five years out of the Universal Service Fund to expand Wi-Fi networks in schools and libraries. Dissenting, Republican Commissioner Ajit Pai predicted that the funding increase will require the FCC to raise surcharges that Americans pay on their phone bills.